So far, no meatballs . . .

Obviously, the weather forecasters have gotten it wrong. Let’s see if we can do better!

Poetry Challenge #125

Cloudy with a Chance of . . .

Write a weather forecast poem.

To begin, fill in the blanks:

______________ with a chance of _________________

Write your poem in a Weatherperson’s voice (or channel Anchorman’s Ron Burgundy). Make your forecast factual or fantastical—creator’s choice!

Liberally sprinkle your poem with weather terms.

Set your timer for 7 minutes

Don’t think about it too much; just do it!

Start writing!

Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge more than 8 years ago (who’s counting?). We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us in the Challenge, let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.

Click on Fishbowl link below and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):

SUBSCRIBE TO THE FISHBOWL

A-B-C

1-2-3

Baby, You and Me . . .

Keep tapping those tootsies as we wind up for a real riddler of a prompt:

Poetry Challenge #124

Alphabet Riddle Poems Easy as ABC

Many forms of poetry are like puzzles—you try to fit the right words into a certain order or have the right number of beats/syllables on each line. Here are four poetry puzzles. Choose one to solve today and come back to this when you’re stuck for a topic some other day. 

1. Can you use every letter of the alphabet in a poem? The letter can appear anywhere in the word and can be in any order.

2. For the next puzzle, you need to use a word starting with each letter of the alphabet in order. You can add other words between your words to help your poem make sense.

3. How about starting each line with a letter of the alphabet? How long a poem can you make that makes some sense?

4. Pick one letter. Can you write a poem using twenty words that begin with that letter?

Set your timer for 7 minutes

Don’t think about it too much; just do it!

Start writing!

Alphabet Riddlers Playlist:

ABC by the Jackson Five

Alphabet Song

L.O.V.E. by Bert Kaempfert with lyrics by Milt Gabler

Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge back in the before time. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. (This one is Cindy’s.) If you join us by writing a poem, let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.

Click on Fishbowl link below and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):

SUBSCRIBE TO THE FISHBOWL

Icon! Diva! Pop Idol!…personal role model Cher is 80! (Her birthday was May 20, 1946.) All my life, she has been there—loud, alive, unappologetic! And dang, at 80 still rockin’!

Cher looks as fabulous as she does because she has had a little help. She doesn’t hide it, even jokes about having had rhinoplasty, breast augmentation, a facelift, braces, along with “regular Botox, dermal fillers, and facial fat grafting.” But those abs! That stamina! That voice!

Best yet, Cher has won an Academy Award for Best Actress, Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, Grammy Award for Best Dance Recording, Kennedy Center Honors, Cannes Best Actress, Golden Globe for Supporting Actress, Golden Globe for Television Series, Golden Globe for Best Actress, Billboard Icon Award, Donatello for Best Foreign Actress, 17 Top-10 singles (12 as a solo)… and so many more!

If you ask me, she didn’t only sing “If I could turn back time…” she did it!

If Cher can reverse time, so can we…if only with our words! Let’s try!

Poetry Challenge #123.5

Reverso

A reverse poem (Reverso)is a poem that conveys two contrasting meanings when read from top to bottom and then from bottom to top. The meaning of the poem changes but it needs to make sense whichever direction you read. Or, as Marilyn Singer, a Reverso Masteroso put it:

“A reverso is a poem with two halves. In a reverso, the second half reverses the lines from the first half, with changes only in punctuation and capitalization — and it has to say something completely different from the first half.”

Here’s an example of Marilyn Singer’s reverso poem, aptly named “In Reverse” from her picture book collection of fairy tale reverso’s Mirror Mirror.

1. Choose a theme or topic.

2. Write a short, simple poem. (short and simple because we don’t have much time, say 3 to 5 lines)

Rewrite the poem backwards. For instance, if you begin with a 3 line poem: 1-2-3, then line 4 will repeat line 3, 5 will repeat 2, 6 will repeat line 1. Like this: 1-2-3-3-2-1

Here’s the tricky/fun part: rework the punctuation, capitalization, etc. to give the second half a different meaning.

(You might want to write on paper so you can cut the lines up and rearrange them easily.)

Ready????

Set your timer for 7 minutes

Don’t think about it too much; just do it!

Start writing!

And when you’re finished, click on the video and dance Like it’s 1999!…Like Nobody’s Watching! …Like Cher!

Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge more than 8 years ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge, let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.

Click on Fishbowl link below and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):

SUBSCRIBE TO THE FISHBOWL

Furthermore: I am craving a bagel.

Add to that: I didn’t have a clear idea of what this week’s 7-minute challenge should be so I did what I often do when I need inspiration, or a laugh, or to shake my head at some of the silly, fun, delightful…. odd ideas humans dream up to use as excuses for holidays. I consulted the National Day Calendar.

Helpful hint: you can search subjects or dates or categories willy-nilly and someone somewhere will have created a holiday for it. Try it sometime (not now.) And, as you read on, remember where I began…

SUCCESS! SURPRISE! DELISH-DELIGHT!

January 15th, is both National Hat Day and National Bagel Day. I’ve given some thought the matter and still, I have absolutely no idea what hats and bagels have to do with each other…except, of course, that everyone hungry/bagel-crazed enough to be bageling on the streets of Manhattan in the winter chill is wearing—or should be wearing—a hat. Maybe you’ll have a better idea:

Poetry Challenge #122

Hat’s Off to Bagels, Hats & Bagel Hats

Think of words that have to do with either hat or bagel.

Come up with words to describe your pick, words you think of when you have one or the other, or words that bagels and/or hats bring to mind.

Now use those words to form a shape poem. Fit the words into either the shape of a bagel or the shape of a hat. Make it beautiful!

Set your timer for 7 minutes

Don’t think about it too much; just do it!

Start writing!

As soon as I finish my poem, guess where I’m going? Why don’t you join me? On the way there I’ll wear a hat; on the way home, I’ll be wearing a bagel—with creme cheese!

Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge sooooooo many bagels ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us by writing a poem, let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.

Click on Fishbowl link below and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):

SUBSCRIBE TO THE FISHBOWL

With regards to weather, Will Rogers famously said, “Give it, time, it will change.”

The trouble is, that the lack of sunny skies has given me a case of the gloomies. (Maybe you too?) to Combat it, I’m conjuring “Joy Germs.”

Technically, Joy Germ day is supposed to be January 8th. National Joy Germ Day is a holiday created to remind people “that by being positive and treating people with kindness, we can influence those around us and pass that positive attitude on to others.

Joy Germ day was established in 1981 by Joan White of Syracuse, New York, in honor of her mother.  Here’s Joan’s prescription for observing Joy Germ Day: “Laugh, smile, be kind, inspire and spread the one type of germ that is good for everyone to catch!”

Poetry Challenge #121

Joy Germs

What’s your Joy? Imagine you are a scientist in a happy lab concocting your own Joy Germ.

What would those ingredients be?

What’s your Joy?

What does it smell like?

Taste like?

Sound like?

How would you spread your Joy Germ?

Write a poem entitled Joy Germ

Set your timer for 7 minutes

Don’t think about it too much; just do it!

Start writing!

Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge more than 8 years ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge, let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.

Click on Fishbowl link below and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):

SUBSCRIBE TO THE FISHBOWL

The most common resolutions people make are: exercise more, eat less, spend more time with family, get organized, save money, learn a new skill.

Sound familiar?? See image: Look Familiar???

Now that you’ve seen it, tear it up and burn it, erase it from you mind. Time for new resolutions! As they sing in the song*:

It's a new dawn
It's a new day
It's a new life
For me.

Poetry Challenge #120

Renew Attitude

Spring, like no other, is a season of renewal. So let’s do it!

In the form of a poem, write new resolutions. But not the “good for me” kind of resolutions. Write the “make me smile” hope-filled resolutions.

Fill them with spring color and life!

Set your timer for 7 minutes

Don’t think about it too much; just do it!

Start writing!

*Line from “Feeling Good” written by Leslie Bricusse and Anthony Newley, sung most notably by Nina Simone

Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge

We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us by writing a poem, let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.

Click on Fishbowl link below and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):

SUBSCRIBE TO THE FISHBOWL

‍ ‍

Poetry Challenge #120

Resolutionist’s 2020 Resolutions

“Feels like it’s raining all over the world.”

Consider the climate—weather and otherwise—what I/we need now, is some Kate, and some Leo* and... Iridescence!

I just learned (thanks to my beloved Merriam-Webster) that the word “iridescence” come from Iris.

“Iris, the Greek goddess of the rainbow, took messages from Mount Olympus to earth, and from gods to mortals or other gods, using the rainbow as her stairway. “

Thus, Iridescence is “the glowing, shifting, colorful quality of a rainbow, also seen in an opal, a light oil slick, a butterfly wing, or the mother-of-pearl that lines an oyster shell.” ‍ ‍

Which brings us back to the one thing I have not seen over the past 3 days, in any of the 3 different cities across 3 different time zones.

Poetry Challenge #119

Rainbow Logic

If we can’t find a rainbow arching across the sky right now, we’ll have to create our own. Here goes:

1. Write the word “Light” or “Rainbow” vertically down the length of a page.

2. For each letter, write a related word or idea beginning with that letter extending out horizontally.

3. Take a few moments to refine your poem. Try adding or changing some words to add interest, rhythm or rhyme to your poem.

4. Select your favorite word or image to be the title of your poem.

Set your timer for 7 minutes

Don’t think about it too much; just do it!

Start writing!

And, for a real treat, check out Patricia Maclachlan’s brilliante picture book biography of Henri Matisse. A tidbit of trivia: it came about when her editor/publisher Neal Porter asked her what she was working on she said, (and I am paraphrasing) a little something I love but I don’t think anyone will ever publish. His response . . .

*If you know the movie I’m riffing of here, send word, you’ll receive a prize!

Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge many rainbows ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. (This one is Cindy’s.) If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge, let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.

Click on Fishbowl link below and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):

SUBSCRIBE TO THE FISHBOWL

And then, just when we are used to it, snippet by snippet night will begin stealing back moments. . .

and there is not one thing we can do about it. There are some things that are simply

Beyond Our Control. . .

Poetry Challenge #119

Beyond Your Control

Pretend I’m waving a ticking pocket watch before your eyes.

“You’re getting sleepy…sleepy…your eyes are getting heavy” …TICK-TICK-TICK

Let your eyes drift closed. . . Tick-tick . . .Now image you’ve been hypnotized into doing something that you would not ordinarily do. Something so out of character you’d have to be under some sort of unworldly power to attempt it.

And now, because the clock is ticking, fast as you can write a poem about where you are, what you’re doing, and how you feel doing it.

Keep it short. Four lines maximum. Because the clock is ticking!

Set your timer for 7 minutes

Don’t think about it too much.

just

Start

writing!

Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge more than 8 summer ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge, let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.

Click on Fishbowl link below and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):

SUBSCRIBE TO THE FISHBOWL

Today, April 15th is according to nationaldaycalendar.com, is Purple Up Day! Rubber Eraser Day! and Take a Wild Guess Day!

And, if that’s not enough to get you blowing those weird paper roll-up horns, it’s the 30th Anniversary of National Poetry Month!

Poetry Challenge #117

A Month of Holidays

As the inimitable fashion of Kool and the Gang:

Celebration time…Come on!

No matter what day it is, find something to celebrate. (If only it’s not having to listen to me singing along…because you know I am.)

Choose something to celebrate. Erasers maybe, or purple, or the neighbor’s irritatingly loud wind chimes. (At least they haven’t blown off into my yard or through a window…YET!)

Write a celebratory poem.

Jazz your poem up with some celebratory words: Clap, cheer, rejoice, glitter, shine, hallelujah!

And if you need some mood music, click and listen to Kool and the Gang singing Celebration!

Set your timer for 7 minutes

Don’t think about it too much; just do it!

Start writing!

And when you’re finished…CELEBRATE!

Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge over 3500 days ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. (This one is Cindy’s.) If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge, let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.

Click on Fishbowl link below and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):

SUBSCRIBE TO THE FISHBOWL

At first you might baulk. Complain. Resist ala Baby in Dirty Dancing. But it works . . .

Poetry Challenge #116

Prompt Time

Writing from a prompt pushes you to write fast and helps you free your mind. Get your notebook or computer ready and set your timer. Below is a one-line prompt.

No one tells me what to do…

You use the prompt as your first line of a poem, your last line, or a line in the middle. Read it and then write as fast as you can.

Ready . . .

Set your timer for 7 minutes

Don’t think about it too much; just do it!

Start writing!

Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge over eight years ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. (This one is Cindy’s.) If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge, let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.

Click on Fishbowl link below and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):

SUBSCRIBE TO THE FISHBOWL

(If you were relieved to read that, then the joke is on me.)

Speaking of jokes, while clicking around for some prank I could play today (that wasn’t cruel or difficult), I came upon these definitely sound like pranks, but are they???

For now, though, let’s set “Velveeta” hair color aside (as if we could), and focus on my news. (Hopefully you’ll find it inspiring?)…

RAINBOW KITE could really, really, really use your help (and so could I). If you are willing to write a review and post in on Amazon, Goodreads, Barnes & Noble, etc. I’ll send you a digital copy of the book to review. Send me a note!

And now, the answer to the big question of the day: Are those products fake or real?

I had absolutely nothing to do with these products*, finding them or gather the info—it’s from a post by Ariana Losch published in Sporked “Out to Be Real” (And the joke seems to be on me as the image on my screen isn’t showing the whole article excerpt.) I Hope it is on yours. But if not, click to read the article.

*I did a quick search for the Doctor Pepper TicTacs, they are available on line.

Spring, and out-of-the-box ideas, and Kites—That’s Inspiring!

Think “knitting” and an image of the “quiet old lady whispering ‘hush’” springs to many a mind. But that’s bunk. All sort of folks knit. All ages and stages. And it’s not just about yarn (although yarns are told.)

Knitting is such a useful word. In the same way yarn becomes sweaters, wounds knit back together. Families are closely knit. Brows knit in consternation or contemplation. Thoughts knit together become ideas, just as words knit together can be poetry.

In Merriam-Webster speak, knitting is “a series of connected loops,” so that’s where we’ll begin.

Poetry Challenge #115

Knit Wits

Close your eyes and write down the first word that pops into your mind. One word. That word will be the title of your poem.

Next, quickly list words that you associate with your word.  From that list, choose the best five.

Take a moment to reorder those five words into a sort of pattern that makes sense to you.

Let’s use our wits to knit those words together to create a poem.

For our first effort, we’ll use a simple knit one, purl two pattern. Consider those five words to be your “knit” stitches. The “purl” part of our poem will be modifiers. Let’s get knitting!

Write your first “knit” word. Below it “purl” two modifiers. Below that purl, write your next “knit” word, then “purl” two; continue in this knit one-purl two pattern until you come to the end of your word list. Just like that you’ve knitted a 10-line poem.

Set your timer for 7 minutes

Don’t think about it too much; just do it!

Start writing!

*Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge more than eight years ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.

Click on Fishbowl link below and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):

SUBSCRIBE TO THE FISHBOWL

User Error is such a useful term. At one and the same time it blames and forgives:

“Yes, I did it, but it wasn’t my fault.”

Poetry Challenge #114

User Error

Think back on a time when you’ve had a system malfunction? A SNAFU? A mess up? A day, event, moment when you dropped the ball: BONG BONG BONG (If you haven’t ever had one on those times, make one up.)

Take a moment to dreg up all the miserable, embarrassing, nauseating, gut-wrenching details. Allow yourself to wallow in the misery for one more minute.

Write a poem about that time. Try not to rhyme. Not to spell correctly. Not to sound pleasant. Let it be harsh and raw—try breaking the lines in odd places. It other words: write a lousy poem.

End it with those two huge words: USER ERROR!

Set your timer for 7 minutes

Don’t think about it too much; just do it!

Start writing!

*Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge….dang, I forget how long ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.

Click on Fishbowl link below and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):

SUBSCRIBE TO THE FISHBOWL

J. Wellington Whimpy, as any Popeye fan knows, would do just about anything for a hamburger. Parisians rioted over the lack of break, likewise so did Starbuck fans during a recent run on Pumpkin Latte (not really), but, I imagine they would. Cindy’s weakness is lobster. Mine (in case you’re gifting) is salted caramel. What’s your favorite food?

Poetry Challenge #113

One Must Ask Children and Birds

“One must ask children and birds how cherries and strawberries taste”— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.

Pick a food that begins with a consonant (not a, e, i, o, or u). Can you think of other foods that begin with the same letter? List 5-10 foods that begin with the same letter. Next, list 3-10 foods that end with that letter. Then, list 3-10 foods that have that letter in the middle. Finally, list 3 verbs and 3 adjectives that have to do with food and contain your letter. 

The repetition of a consonant sound is called alliteration. Many times tongue twisters are made from these repeated sounds. Use words from all your lists to write an alliterative list poem. Read it aloud and see if it trips your tongue.

Set your mind to channel FOOD

Set your timer for 7 minutes

Don’t think about it too much; just do it!

Start writing!

*Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge way too many meals ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.

Click on Fishbowl link below and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):

SUBSCRIBE TO THE FISHBOWL

When we were about twelve, my friend Theresa and I closed ourselves in a music room at CSULB (where my mom was working on her Master’s Degree) and played over and over and over—her on sax, me on piano—the opening phrases of the song Ruthann Friedman song Windy. You know the one:

Whose peekin’ out from under a stairway/ callin’ a name that’s lighter than air?/ whose bending down to give me a rainbow? /everyone knows it’s Windy./ Whose trippin’ down the streets . . .

over and over . . . Theresa and I only stopped when the guy in the next room knocked.

Turned out, he too played a sax. We only wished we could. . .

Said to emote a sound reminiscent of “the echo of an echo” . . .  a resonance “situated at the edge of silence,” the saxophone was invented by Adolphe Sax in the 1840s (patented in 1846.) Sax only received a 15-year patent for the sax (immediately others began copying his design). Sax’s sax however was the first.

Poetry Challenge #112

Bend it like Adolphe . . . Sax that is!

In honor of Adolphe Sax, inventor of the saxophone and several other sax-ish instruments (saxhorn, saxotromba, saxtuba). His saxophone is often described as being “the closest instrumental match to the human voice.” An instrument whose tone (and I write “whose” purposefully) can, in talented hands, mimic human voice inflection.

In preparation for this prompt, Listen to a Saxophone play. This post highlights “The 20 Greatest Saxophonists of All Times” with clippings of each playing.

And now for the poem:

Let your mind wander as you listen. Where does the music take you? How does it make you feel? What does it make you feel?

Or, look at the saxophone itself, it’s shape. And ask yourself, if a saxophone were an animal, which animal would it be?

Draw on these saxophone images and feelings to write a Saxophonic poem.

Set your mind on “Cool”

Set your timer for 7 minutes

Don’t think about it too much; just do it!

FYI: The child of Belgian instrument makers, Adolphe Sax is credited with having, by the age of 14, invented at least invented about 9 instruments. For more on Adolphe Sax, including why he was nicknamed “Little Sax, the ghost,” read on:  

“Meet Adolphe Sax: The Badass Who Invented The Saxophone And Cheated Death 7 Times” by Andrew Milne, Sept 5, 2019. 

*Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge so many solos ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.

Click on Fishbowl link below and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):

SUBSCRIBE TO THE FISHBOWL

Back in my sleep-over camp-out nights, with the campfire crackling and tossing spooky shadows, the wind howling and tree branches scraping on the tent, we used to make scary spookier still with a game called

Yikes!

Things that go bump in the night. . . Scary, right?

Scary how a simple bump sound—in the right setting at the right time—sends tingles, quivers, hair-raising heebie-jeebies shivers chasing up our spines.

Oooooohhhhh CREAK

SCRATCH EEK

EEK YOWL

HOWL

Mwahaha

SCREECH SCRITCH

WHAT’S THAT NOISE . . .

Thump THWACK

thwaaaaaaaaaa

It is said that everyone fears the same thing—the Unknown. Thus, the secret to writing scary is not what you write—but what you leave out.

“Readers will imagine the rest, filling in the gaps with whatever scares them most,” noted Nocturium in a post**.  

Which takes me right back to those spine-tingling sounds. Let’s give it a Gooo—GH!

Poetry Challenge #111

One Dark and Storm . . . YIKES!

Write a scary poem.

Now, make it even scarier still by replacing specifics with sounds words.

Set the timer for 7 minutes.

Don’t think about it too much;

See if you can scare yourself silly!

**For more spooky stuff here’s a great post: How to Write a Scary Story on the Nocturim

*Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge a terrifying number of days ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.

Click on Fishbowl link below and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):

SUBSCRIBE TO THE FISHBOWL

It is said that the Boston Cream Pie was invented in Boston—hence the name. More specifically, “In 1856, at Boston’s Parker House Hotel, French chef Monsieur Augustine Francois Anezin created this pudding and cake combination.” It was declared the official dessert of Massachusetts in 1996. (In case you need cause to celebrate, Oct 23rd is National Boston Creme Pie Day!)

Poetry Challenge #110

Boston Creme Pie . . . Oh My!

I don’t live in Boston or in Massachusetts. And I can’t say whether I love Boston Cream Pie. But from the looks of it, I think I might—I do love Boston Cream donuts—And looking at those yellow cake layers, that creamy custard y-pudding filling, the smooth chocolate icing. Yum!

What might the official dessert of your town be if YOU got to name it?

Write a poem describing your dessert. Make our mouths water just thinking about it!

Set the timer for 7 minutes.

Start writing!

Don’t think about it too much; just do it!

Afterwards, celebrate with Boston Creme Pie! Here’s a recipe.

P.S. I looked it up. For what it’s worth, the chef who created the first Boston Creme whatever, baked it in a pie tin, so that’s why he called it a pie.

*Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge more than 8-years of dessert ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.

Click on Fishbowl link below and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):

SUBSCRIBE TO THE FISHBOWL

Giant Popcorn, extra butter and salt, a coke for Mom, a thermos of something for Dad, a baggie of home-packed candies for us kids.

My brother and I, in our jammies, loved playing on the playground—with one eye on the cartoons barely visible in the dusk.

Our parents picked the movies. They did not expect us to watch the movies. (After all, in the summer it didn’t get dark until way past our bedtimes.) They expected we’d last through the previews, and the cartoons (drive-in movies always started with a cartoon or two.) That’s why we went to the drive-in in our jammies. Nighty-night kiddos.

Hello “Illustrated Man.”

Hello memories seared into my brain. (Maybe the one time I didn’t fall immediately asleep.). Dang it was freaky.

Hello Ray Bradbury!

Ray Bradbury published more than 30 books and 600 short stories in his lifetime, Illustrated Man being one; Fahrenheit 451 being most banned . (He passed in 2012). Even now his books are edgy, funny, timely, infinitely readable and relatable.

And get this: Ray Bradbury, NEVER WORKED A DAY IN HIS LIFE!

That Inspires Me! (read on)

"I’ve never worked a day in my life. I’ve never worked a day in my life. The joy of writing has propelled me from day to day and year to year. I want you to envy me, my joy. Get out of here tonight and say: ‘Am I being joyful?’ And if you’ve got a writer’s block, you can cure it this evening by stopping whatever you’re writing and doing something else. You picked the wrong subject.” — Ray Bradbury at The Sixth Annual Writer’s Symposium by the Sea, 2001

Postscript: After this blog post published, I received the following note from Kevin Kane, an author, playwright, musician—baseball historian etc. etc. whose life reads like adventure. Bradbury fans read on:

If you don’t have a physical dictionary (Borrow a library copy or Go buy one!!! You should have one!!!), you can use a website such as m-w.com or dictionary.com and look for a list of words of the day.

Poetry Challenge #109

Dictionary Roulette

One of my favorite prompts when I get stuck with any writing is to take a dictionary, open to a random page, and write down the first word I see. Sometimes I roll three dice and open to that page. Sometimes I have someone pick a number between 1 and 948 (the number of pages in my favorite dictionary) and then another number between 1 and 68 (the average number of words on the two pages) and I find my word that way.

Using the Close-Your-Eyes-and-Point method, Roll-the-Dice method, Pick-A-Number method, find 5 words. Write a 5-line poem using all 5 words.

Pick 5 Words

Set the timer for 7 minutes.

Start writing!

Don’t think about it too much; just do it.

*Cindy Faughnan and I began this 7-Minute Poetry Challenge almost 8 days ago. We now take turns creating our own prompts to share with you. (This one is Cindy’s.) If you join us in the 7-Minute Poetry Challenge let us know by posting the title, a note, or if you want, the whole poem in the comments.

Click on Fishbowl link below and sign up to receive email notifications from Kelly's blog (aka The Fishbowl):

SUBSCRIBE TO THE FISHBOWL